Spot Printing for Creative Effects Using Our Clear Dry Ink Capability

Clear Dry Ink adds the appearance of a spot gloss coating on printed collateral, also referred to as Spot Printing. Although it appears to look like a spot UV coating, it is not. UV coating is a liquid coating dried with a UV curable light (a fairly dangerous process that uses tremendous amounts of energy). Clear dry toner, available on our new X1000 digital press, is a 5th color unit that can highlight images for visual variety and make them pop off the page. Although not as noticeable on the printed sheet as a UV coating, It can draw attention to a headline or enhance photos and logos. It can even simulate pearlescent or a metallic appearance to non-metallic images. Other uses are adding a digital watermark or enhancing the print quality of textured stocks. All this in a low melt, environmentally friendly, low energy way.

The process needed for you to create the 5th plate is pretty easy and straight forward. SLB Printing will provide this information on our web site and in a PDF document as we get closer to the install date in early October. If you already know how to create a spot color, it’s the exact same process, you’ll just call the new plate “clear”.

Just in time for our busiest season, not only will the Clear Dry Ink add to the creative effects and visual impact to your printed collateral, the X1000 is going to make quick work of these jobs at the highest quality possible. The X1000 prints at 2400 x 2400 dpi with a variety of screening options available including Stochastic screening. The high dpi provides excellent sharpness and uniformity, outstanding midtones, detailed shadows, excellent photo rendering with pure neutrals along with crisp text. All this in an environmentally friendly manner using Emulsion Aggregation “EA” dry ink toners and no fuser oil. I hope you are as excited about all the new possibilities of this press as we are. Especially the tremendous appeal of Clear Dry Ink and how much value it’ll add to your printed collateral.